Constitutional
equal rights amendments similar to Amendment 1 have been approved by
voters in these states: Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland,
Massachusetts, Montana, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Texas
and Washington. The more than 20 year record of state Equal Rights Amendments
is impressive.

Amendment
empowers women to fight discrimination on the job, in the classroom,
in the courtroom, and in the pocketbook.

1.

Amendment
Helps
Older Women

Discrimination impoverishes older women. Women over the age of 65 are
twice as likely as men to live in poverty.

Wage discrimination is especially severe for older women workers. In
Iowa, full time female workers between the ages of 45 and 54 earn only
54 cent[s] for ever $1 paid to men.

One of the primary reasons so many older women live on the brink of
economic survival is gender discrimination in insurance and pensions.
The insurance industry profits greatly from discriminatory practices.
For instance:

Retired
women in Iowa receive $1.8 million per year less in annuities than
men with the same policies

Gender
bias in life insurance costs older women in Iowa $1.7 million per
year.

Amendment
will improve the
economic well-being of older women by prohibiting gender discrimination.

2.

Amendment
Helps
Employed Women

Improving
Women's Wages and Job Opportunities
Women Workers in Iowa are clustered in low-paying jobs. 60% of all female
employees in Iowa work in only three occupational categories--clerical,
sales and service.

Employers consistently
pay workers in these female dominated occupations less than employees
in male-dominated jobs. And even in the same occupations, women
workers in Iowa receive less compensation than their male co-workers.

In states with constitutional equality provisions, women have
successfully challenged discriminatroy laws and policies, including
those that appear neutral but disproportionately deny them jobs,
promotions, and higher wages.

Increasing
Women's Odds in Fighting Discrimination
Women face major difficulties in discrimination suits against
employers in Iowa. Amendment
heightens the level of judicial scrutiny in gender discrimination
cases, shifting the burden in employment discrimination cases
from women to those who discriminate. Amendment
increases women's chances of winning sex discrimination lawsuits.

Ending
Discrimination in Employment Benefits
Women who work in low-wage jobs receive inferior employment benefits.
Service and clerical jobs often do not provide health insurance.

Women face discrimination in disability and health insurance.
Iowa law does not require group or individual insurance policies
to cover the costs of normal pregnancies.

3.

Amendment
Helps
Homemakers

Amendment
gives the work
of homemakers economic value, improving financial settlements
and child support payments in divorce.

In states with constitutional provisions similar to Amendment
, the unpaid
work of homemakers is viewed as an economic contribution to the
household.

Courts and legislatures in states with constitutional equal rights
amendments have valued homemaking as an occupation that deserves
economic recognition

4.

Amendment
Strengthens
Existing Laws

Amendment strengthens
existing laws that prohibit gender discrimination by closing loopholes
and providing a higher constitutional standard for prohibiting
fender discrimination. It also provides a comprehensive guarantee
of equal rights for women and men that otherwise can be easily
and quickly reversed piece by piece at the whim of the state legislature.

5.

Amendment
Benefits Men

Men will derive many direct benefits from passage of Amendment
. By enhancing
family income through reducing economic discrimination against
women, men will benefit. A cheap labor pool threatens salaries
of men as well as women. Enhancing women's opportunities eventually
increases wages for all.

Eliminating gender discrimination in insurance benefits the family
finances and aids older men in such areas as auto insurance pricing.
Men's role as parent has increased value and improves their opportunity
for parental leave and child custody.

6.

Find Amendment
On Your
Ballot!

The location of Amendment
on the ballot differs from county to county. Look first at the
top or bottom of your ballot. If it is not in those locations
turn the ballot over to the reverse side. If you can not find
Amendment on
the reverse side of the ballot look in pages 2 or 3. Wherever
you vote, make sure to find and vote yes on Amendment
on your ballot!

>

Vote Yes Amendment

Here's
The Hidden Agenda Of ERA Opponents

ERA
Opponents Are Using Scare Tactics. Don't Let Them Get Away with It!

Pat
Robertson has a hidden agenda. He wants to take over Iowa politics!
Since 1991 Ione Dilley and Steve Sheffler, both leaders in the Iowa Christian
Coalition (ICC), have created a powerful grassroots organization to promote
their extreme rightwing agenda.

Opposing
the Equal Rights Amendment provides a vehicle to meet the ICC's 1992
targets of founding chapters in Iowa's 20 largest counties and of training
precinct captains in 1,500 of Iowa's 2,900 precincts. The ICC's Dilley
is a leader in the anti-Equal Rights Amendment coalition.

The
ICC wants to be ready for 1996, the year of the next presidential election.
The ICC is part of Robertson's national Christian Coalition, which by
August already had raised more than $13 million for its goal.

Robertson
and his Iowa allies have distributed tens of thousands of brochures
in Iowa that are full of falsehoods and distortions. By clouding the
issue these falsehoods help promote their hidden agenda.

The
political agenda of this extreme right wing coalition must be hidden
because their goals do not have the support of a majority of Iowans.
They want to take the right to legal abortion away from women and
eliminate seperation of church and state -- just two major planks of
their extreme agenda.

INSURANCE:
ERA has NOT increased insurance rates. To the contrary, it has
given people the power to fight sex discrimination in auto, life, health,
and disability insurance as well as pensions and annuities. Such discrimination
costs people billions of dollars in overcharges and underpayments.

For
example, if auto insurance pricing was based on miles driven and not
upon the sex of the driver, women's rates would be reduced because women
drive half as much as men on the average. And for older drivers, both
women and men, rates would be reduced because older drivers drive less
than average. The Equal Rights Amendment and non-sexist pricing benefit
both women and men!

VETERANS'
BENEFITS: War veterans do NOT lose their benefits. You would
have heard the cry all the way to Iowa if veterans in Massachusetts,
Pennsylvania, and the other ERA states had lost their benefits because
of the ERA.

GAY
RIGHTS: Opponents of the ERA have made false claims about homosexual
rights and the ERA. Instead of fighting discrimination they have participated
in gay bashing -- spreading fear, not understanding. In NO state
have homosexuals gained rights using a state Equal Rights Amendment.
Gay marriages are NOT legal in any state of the union.

Phyllis
Schlafly and the Eagle Forum--the leading group against the ERA--have
gone so far as to claim an ERA-AIDS connection. Well we don't have the
ERA in most states and we do have AIDS everywhere.

ABORTION:
The Iowa State Attorney General has said that "NO significant
change in the present status of the law on abortion will occur should
proposed Amendment
be adopted."